About

Former lurker, now blogger. I’m a mom who knits, writes, and tries to manage the chaos that three kids and a puppy stir up.

Here are a few random facts about me:

I studied Latin and ancient Greek. Yes, I did.

I drive a minivan. My Jedi name would be Joan VanDriver.

I hate chipmunks. Sure, they’re cute, but let’s be clear: they’re still rodents.

I make apple pie and snickerdoodles for my family because they love them, but I am not a fan. There’s no chocolate in them. Why waste the calories?

I don’t drink soda anymore. I used to have a serious Diet Coke habit, but I gave it up. Took me six hard months to lose my taste for it, although now I drink way too much coffee.

I enjoy the first four hours of any DIY project and then I just want the darn thing finished.

I do not have a green thumb, but I love having a vegetable garden.

Summer is my fourth favorite season. I know, I know — everyone loves summer, but I often find it to be too hot, too bright, too much. It’s not that I hate it — I just like the other three seasons better.

I love Chicago.

I knit when I can, dream about knitting when I can’t, and dislike crochet. Let’s not talk about the hook, m’kay?

I did live in the South for a time in both high school and grad school. And yes, I inadvertently slip into Southerisms like “All y’all,” and “fixin’ to” (as in, “Are all y’all fixin’ to go to the mall?”). It tickles my Chicago-born-and-bred husband to no end.

I wish I could play musical instruments with ease and authority. I cannot.

Feel free to share in the comments or drop me a line at thethingaboutjoan AT gmail DOT com. Thanks for stopping by!

Hi. I’ve been telling this woman I do some consulting for about your blog. Not sure if you’re interested, but wanted you to know about the opportunity.
Go Girl Communications
We’re looking for a few good bloggers! We are in need of 8-10 Chicago or Wisconsin-based bloggers to participate in a May 2012 campaign. If you are interested, shttps://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dDJNQmZodEI0Ql83TVFQMUdGa1dOUnc6MQ
docs.google.com

I think you may have been nominated for this already, but it’s nice to be recognized more than once! I nominated you for the “One Lovely Blog Award.” Check out the details here: http://thecoffeeclubandme.wordpress.com/

Hi Denise — My Rav handle is “joanie”. I must confess that I barely use the friend function over there (I’m a pattern-finder and forums-lurker), but I’d love it if you’d friend me. Might be just the nudge I need to make new connections over there. See you over there!
Joan

I don’t like summer either. Spent most of my life living in excruciatingly hot countries (including the States, NC, and I can fake a pretty decent Southern accent even though I’m British!). I love dogs and have a little adopted mixed breed. You may not be interested since you seem to have your own thing going on very much, but I’m going to mention it anyway just in case :-) …My name is Tilda, and I came looking for knitting-focused (and craft) blogs for a reason. I do a Blog Challenge, which until now has been focused mainly on writing and a photo challenge. I would like to introduce some more creative elements to the next Challenge, however, which is due to start fairly soon, and I have been thinking of adding a knitting part to the Challenge (as well as drawing, painting, poetry and probably other crafts). But before I commit to a knitting challenge, for example, I need to go around some knitting-focused blogs to ask if any knitters would be interested in participating.

Do you think that might be something that would interest you or your followers? The knitting challenge would simply be that I would offer two themes and then knitters could knit anything they like based on either theme, whichever they prefer. For example the themes might be “rustic” and “sparkle”. Then the knitter (or other craft) could choose whichever theme they prefer and make *anything* they like as long as it incorporates that theme.

If they like, they could participate in the rest of the Challenge and be eligible to earn Awards to be displayed on their blog, and win prizes, but that is purely optional. Here’s my blog in case you’d like to take a look at the current Challenge and if you think you or anyone else would be interested in participating if I included some more creative aspects to it, including knitting and crafts, would you let me know? http://tfaswift.com.

I’m not trying to plug my blog; I just need to know before I start a more creative challenge if any knitters etc. would know where to find it, or whether they’d even be interested! Thank you so much for your time, and either way, good luck with all your projects! :-)

Hi Tilda, thanks for stopping by! I love a good blog challenge — it’s so interesting to see where people take them, isn’t it? From my perspective, I might shy away from committing to a knitting challenge because, aside from dog sweaters, I’m such a slow knitter and really only dedicate my TV-watching time to it. However, if you threw out a Creative Challenge to “make something” (anything!) that fits under a theme, I’d be a lot more likely to play along. That’s just my two cents, though; other knitters might feel invigorated by a challenge.

I’ll be signing up to follow your blog and I might even try to take your next challenge. Sounds like fun!

Hi there and thank you for your suggestion! I am following your blog now, and I will actually be doing something along the lines you suggested. I’ve been thinking about adding three extra elements to my existing challenge, 1. crafts 2. drawing and painting 3. poetry.

I think “crafts” and “drawing and painting” are so broad that people could do pretty much anything creative with that. Then I would just put forward a couple of themes and they could do whatever they like.

I’d really love it if you would participate in my Challenge in any way that you like! :-) Some people go the whole hog, so to speak, and get quite competitive, while others just dabble here and there doing whichever parts appeal to them. Either way, it certainly draws attention to your blog because my own followers are very curious to see other people’s entries. So you are likely to get more visitors, followers and generally higher stats (I think most bloggers generally like those things! LOL).

Also, I have a rule where nobody is allowed to pass judgment on other people’s contributions to the challenge, and if they want to leave feedback, they must visit that person’s blog directly to do so.

That provides a very safe environment on my blog for people to participate without worrying what others might say, and also it encourages more traffic to your own blog if people would like to leave feedback for your contribution (which they usually do, and it’s always friendly and supportive). I think if someone has gone to the effort of writing or making something for my Challenge, they deserve to benefit from feedback and stats on their own blog, not mine.

So yes, I shall be making it a more broad heading of “crafts” or “drawing and painting” which I think covers almost anything. I really hope to see you around! Thank you for taking the time to have a visit and I really look forward to seeing you “make something” :-)